King's Crossing

The way that I cope with the hard parts of my life is by keeping so busy that I don't have time to deal with them. When the work load subsides, I fill the space with new projects. Suicide Watch Songs itself is one of those projects. During the hardest period of my life, having sixteen hours between the time I left the house and when I got back was standard fare. The hardest part of the day was my drive, which was a half hour either to work or school. It was the one hour of the day that I had nothing to do but deal with my own thoughts, the only time where I had no work to find refuge in. The radio in my vehicle didn't work very well and I would listen to my iPod with headphones. It was during this time that I really solidified my love of dark music. Listening to such desperate music helped me deal with everything that was going on in my life. This song was my favorite during that time, and when I started writing Suicide Watch Songs I told myself that I would write about it only if I could keep the article going for a year. Without further ado, here is Elliott Smith's "King's Crossing"

 "King's Crossing" by Elliott Smith from From A Basement On The Hill


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ezerLW5jPwI

Elliott Smith was a Portland, Oregon based singer/songwriter that, if you are not in the know, would most likely know from the use of his songs in the move Good Will Hunting. The filmmaker and Portland resident, Gus Van Sant, was a fan of Smith's music, and used multiple songs from Smith's third album Either/Or for the film, as well as using a re-lyriced, previously unreleased song, "Miss Misery." This song was given an Academy Award nomination for Best Original Song that year, to be beaten by Celine Dion's "My Heart Will Go On" from Titanic.

Good Will Hunting and it's notoriety launched Smith's career, who after putting out three albums on smaller independent labels, signed with Dreamworks. Smith had previously put out low fidelity, mostly cassette-tape four-tack master recordings. You can even hear the tape record click at the beginning of the first song on Either/Or. Dreamworks would not allow the low level recording style that Smith had started his career with and demanded a higher fidelity product. The following albums, XO and Figure 8, showed off not only Smith's ever growing songwriting prowess, but his intricate arranging skills as well. It turns out that Smith was more than an impeccable songwriter, but a brilliant mind in the studio as well.

On October 23, 2003, Smith died in his home, of two stab wounds to the chest. It was an apparent suicide, though his autopsy did not rule out foul play. The person that first introduced me to Smith's work was also the first person I called when I heard that Smith had died. That man's mother happens to be a nurse stated that stabbing one's self in the chest was extremely rare, not only due to the immense pain, but also because it is extremely hard to do, and was only done by people that were high on PCP. While Smith had long battled substance abuse and alcoholism, his autopsy confirmed that he was clean at the time of his death.

In the year following Smith's death his final album, From A Basement On The Hill, was finished by the musicians and friends that were helping Smith with it and released. The album relies on a different tonal backdrop, and reflects Smith's new interest in noise music. There is an increased attention to background, ambiance, and found sounds. One can hear that throughout the intro to "King's Crossing" and at one particular point it raises an interesting question later in the song.

An abyss of guitars, bouncing piano and wall-of-lost-souls background vocals starts the song, eventually dropping out leaving a sonic gap that Smith walks into with his guitar and the lyrics. "The king's crossing was the main attraction, dominoes falling in a chain reaction. The scraping subject ruled by fear told me whiskey works better than beer."  Already we are unsettled, but we are not sure why. Which dominoes are falling, and why go straight to the hard stuff? "The judge is on vinyl, decisions aren't final and nobody gets a reprieve, and every wave is tidal. If you hang around you're going to get wet." We're going to find out. Even if we don't, it's coming and it's going to spill over.

The wall of lost souls pulls us into what I find as the most poignant line of the song. "I can't prepare for death any more than I already have." The last word heralds the entrance of the drums and organ and the line finishes. "All you can do now is watch the shells. The game looks easy, that's why it sells." Smith is the best songwriter I know at writing simply and making you feel like you've figured out the deepest meaning of some ancient philosopher. For a minute you feel smart, when we really should understand that what's really going on is that Smith 'gets it.' He understands life better than the rest of us and doesn't need to mince words about it. Life is a rigged game. There's only winners and losers and don't get caught on the wrong side of that line.

The next downbeat opens the flood gates for the full orchestration. "Frustrated fireworks inside your head are gonna stand and deliver dark instead." The lyrics and music match so beautifully here. Our character is fighting his own thought process, grasping at ideas, motivation, but instead, in defiance they 'stand and deliver' nothing. "The method acting that pays my bills keeps a fat man feeding in Beverly Hills." Doing that thing that I do, the thing I do best, is worthless to me and is only of value to those who exploit it of me. "I' got a heavy metal mouth. It hurls obscenity, and I get my check from the trash treasury because I took my own insides out." Took my own. Our character destroyed himself, and for something he doesn't really want.

The music makes way for the next verse. "It don't matter 'cause I have no sex life and all I want to do now is inject my ex-wife." A well placed double entendre. Does he want sex, to kill her, or to fuck her to death? Maybe all three. "I've seen the movie and I know what happens. It's Christmas time and the needles on the tree. A skinny Santa is bringing something to me." An obvious fraud, an impostor. "His voice is overwhelming. His speech is slurred, and I only understand every other word." We break wide open again here "Open your parachute and grab your gun, float down like an omen, a setting sun." Head into battle, fall to Earth, same difference. "Read the part and return at five. It's a hell of a role if you can keep it alive." Method act, fall to Earth, same difference. "But I don't care if I fuck up, I'm going on a date with a rich white lady. Ain't life great? Just give me one good reason not to do it..."

I'm not sure about what happens next. It doesn't feel right to me. A lady's voice enters with "because I love you," and Smith answers, "So do it." To me it really feels edited and out of place, unnecessary. Here is live solo version http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nX6etUAIbRU , (lyric at 2:20). The lyrical silence says enough. Speak now or forever hold your peace, and no one speaks. I am not certain of the age of this recording, but it may be as old as 1999. (It sounds quite familiar to a high quality audio recording also available on youtube, but I wanted to let you guys see Smith's sullen demeanor in performance.) Now check out this one, from January of 2003, a few months before Smith's suicide. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AmXf3-iSKhg (lyric at 2:19). Did you hear it? In the crowd, the lady yelling "Because I love you." That is so much more real to me than the studio recording. How does she know? Is she the inspiration for the line? Is she Smith's girlfriend yelling it, an audience plant? Does the mystery girl have a bootleg copy of the track? Or, my favorite scenario; Is she the inspiration? No matter what, the studio version really bothers me. It takes me out of the song, and I want to believe that it's the mixing without Smith's presence that caused the line to stick out like a sore thumb. "So do it ..."

As the interlude fades the lyrics enter for the last time. "This is the place where time reverses. Dead men talk to all the pretty nurses." Time reverses, we count down instead of up. "Instruments shine on a silver tray, don't let me get carried away." Here's where I put on my over analytical cap and look  too deeply at a lyric. Of all the beautifully upfront Elliott Smith lyrics, this is the one I'm going to dissect, and I'm probably going to be wrong. The image is one of a sterile, cold, surgical environment. It gives me a mental flash of a nursing home, or luny bin, a prison where they tell you you're at home. The use of the word instruments keeps gnawing at my brain. Is he talking about musical instruments, not doctors tools? Is he in the sterile, big studio environment? All of the previous lyrics about trading himself for what he thought he wanted? Smith did have to trade in his four-track recorder when he signed a big label contract. Does he wish he was in his basement again, just this time he's on the hill and not in the valley? The oldest recordings of this song I've found with these lyrics came from around the time he signed with Dreamworks. (Just for fun here's an older, alternate lyric version of the song: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LsvR3ekAfUM) Is this Smith pleading, don't swallow me whole, don't make me be who I don't want to be. "Don't let me get carried away."

*Steps up onto soapbox.* A final thought about Elliott Smith; All of us have to stop talking about how "Beatlesque" Smith is. I understand what you're saying, but this man is not in the image of Lennon/McCartney, he is on par, a colleague of Lennon/McCartney, and he deserves the same respect and reverence. If you don't believe me, wait ten years for the current electro-pop phase of music to die down, and read all the upcoming band's interviews where they tell you their influences and I guarantee that Elliott Smith will be on the top of their lists. *Steps down off of soapbox.*

Once again I have to thank all of you for hanging with me through this first year. It's been a lot of fun and I look forward to listening and writing more. Please, if you have suggestions, let me know. I'm very interested in new music and often feel like I'm pigeonholing myself into music that I already like. Send those along, or just comment here on the page, on this Forum, or send me an email directly at suicidesongs@communistdaycarecenter.net